"In 2005, UNESCO Declared the Baul Tradition a:
"Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity".
The above statement is nothing to be proud of!
Here is what you should know!
A Bangladeshi UN official wrote a thesis, to obtain 9 million dollars to preserve Baul through the United Nations, he disappeared. Really noting has been done to preserve Baul other than a little bit of random. His writing were based on Baul being a Persian term and being from Persia.
Now someone with a connection to the UN is trying to make a Documentary on Baul and his trailer shows people who are not Baul, sitting around smoking ganja (cannabis) as if this is Baul and making it fake for a public who still think this is cool? He is from South India, total cultural appropriation for UN funds?
100% NOT true, Baul is not from Persia, Turkey, Uzbekistan or Bangladesh. Their language is not Urdu, there are No such thing as Muslim Islamic Bauls. Sai Aul Dervish Shah and Fakir are NOT Baul.
Oral Sanskrit and Vernacular Birbhum Bengal are Baul.
This Bangladeshi official had no connection to authentic Baul at all, how can he, Baul was extinct decades ago.
https://indiafolkheritageofbengal.weebly.com/cultural-misappropriation.html
Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance.
There are many who say they are Baul but are not and all can be proven and book writers scholars and all just pay anybody who says they are Baul a minimal few rupee's and write books, Baul is never from the leather tanner caste or sect?
This is the perfect example of the lucrative cultural appropriation and duping for grants and funding from the United Nations and other organizations, this is not new. It seems to be very easy to dupe these UN officials and if you have a foot in the door as a saviour activist of some cause, even easier.
Baul was popular and still remains a topic of discussion but very little of what is presented is true. Mish mash of the same name dropping from this family, copy and paste from books as reference to prove you are legit?
Now others are trying to do the same thing, making documentary trailers of Baul of people sitting around smoking ganja who are not even Baul.
However, this person has a connection at the United Nations, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to put together the link? I can bet the guy from Bangalore who is doing this documentary on Baul is going for funding from the United Nations.
Babu Kishan met this fellow in a suburb of Vancouver years back and he didn't have a clue who Babu was. Babu Kishan didn't have a clue who he was, I can only speculate he must have researched, who Babu was and saw Baul did a bit of research and away he went. It is not innocent. Because we looked at his web site and there was zero connection or mention of Baul?
Scholars are trying to see if they copy and paste enough, from scholars to obtain funds if they can create a template to do the same?
The scholars have all written wrong about Baul, the system is broken and it is really boring qualifying all, but the qualifying book by book will be done. It is leading to a complete cultural genocide and then others do the same, Baul is so reduced and watered down.
It has to, if something belonged to you, you would care, if it did not belong to you, you would not care, simple and might even make fun! You, might even appropriate all the Babu Kishan has written, cherry picking and then presenting yourself as an authority on Baul in Youtube video's?
Babu Kishan has had 6 decades of personal experience with this all of this and he knew all the scholars who wrote about Baul from the 1960's onward.
Babu knew Carol Solomon since the 1970's when she first came to India, she even stayed at their home with her friend.
Babu Kishan did 'Master classes' in her classes at the University of Washington and the last time he saw her at her home in Seattle Washington 2008 she passed away in 2009. I was with Babu at her home in 2008. RIP Carol, this is not meant to disparage your memory, this is one example here.
Babu kishan had a many decade friendship with Carol Solomon who obtained funding to do a book on Baul. Babu signed for her funding as per her request.
Then she disaapeared and wrote about Lalon Fakir as a Baul and talked about the 'Bauls of Bangladesh', never telling Babu that she based her book on Lalon Fakir who is not a Baul but a poet further mudding the waters of Baul, adding to the notion association that there acutally was a thing called The Bauls to Bangladesh?
There is no such thing as Muslim Bauls or the Bauls of Bangladesh Fakri Sai, Dervish Aul and Shah or not Bauls.
Baul is only from Birbhum India, which has been extensively written about in the Bengali language but westerners really can not even translate it correctly and to get funding it had to be something new and thus reinforcing, how the twist and scheming that scholars have to go through to get funding for their projects.
When it came to bring a Baul to America as a show piece to present her theories, to obtain money for this project, which she said, she would include Babu Kishan in the whole project because he has always wanted to present Baul correctly?
Instead she cut Babu Kishan and brought in a random Baul for free, by random Baul I mean a person who is not actually a Baul but who would know, they are free?
We know she could not, nor did not want to face her old friend Babu Kishan who had helped her endlessly in India and the USA.
This was so evident in 2008 when we had dinner at her place.
This is the way it is with Baul, it has been really difficult.
It has happened over and over.
Babu has helped more scholars with their thesis, very few give credit, and they have not explained Baul correctly, when Babu has asked them to change it, they avoid him. He was young and so excited that anyone would want to know about his lineage. That is why he supported and helped all Bauls, even creating a huge Mela to support them, how misguided he was, now they and their students have copied all and made up fake lineages.
Writing about Baul from outside Baul and making documentaries about Baul has created a cultural genocide of Baul, it continues. Sounds extreme and you may laugh but is this not the way with all indigenous cultures, why should Baul be any different.
From outside Baul means people who are not trained under a lineage Baul, or scholars who speculate, people with ulterior motives of collecting funds or awards to make them legitimate.
This using of Baul, Babu Kishan has watched since the 1960's.
https://lineagebaul.blogspot.com/2022/06/how-writers-create-false-narratives.html
The Baul's in India were a side note, but again using, Bauls are associated with Bob Dylan, Allen Ginsberg and George Harrison, using stories from this lineage and songs but not naming the poets?
Saying Bauls followed Baba Pagla when they did not or the so called Bauls were not Bauls. All this waters down and reduced Baul, twisting truths everyday. It is a way to get funds, creating new narratives, it is a way to obtain government funds, funds at universities, United Nation funds, and Indian awards.
No one on this earth would even know about Baul without this lineage, however, today they a side note not even mentioned, Nabani Das Khyapa Baul and Brajabala Dasi, Purna Das Baul and Babu Kishan mostly outside of India. The
The term Baul is made of 2 Sanskrit words, Vayu Tula, B is V in Bengal thus, Vayu = Bayu, Tula is to balance, balance what the vital airs (prana) through the breath. Bauls practice what they call as what Babu Kishan explained to me Vayu Dharma is Pranayama through their singing and other techniques.
Vayu Tula = Bayutula, Batula = Baula = Baul, Bauls always shorten things down, this does not mean the watering down and the reductionism that is going on today.
The oral part of Baul is oral Sanskrit. I would suppose anybody using this statement understands that the oral is oral Sanskrit and has been taught by their Guru!
This is the level of using Baul, it is rampant.
It is impossible to preserve the Bauls of Bangladesh because they never existed, Sai Aul Dervish and Fakir are NOT Baul they are Islamic Sufi and different from Baul.I have to laugh, they say, Baul does not care who the poets are? You are not even close to being a Baul if you do not know?
Everybody is cheating so why not make a new narrative and cheat this indigenous Baul lineage?
This lineage the only Baul lineage a Sanskrit oral Baul lineage and tradition always knows who wrote the poetry!
Muslims do not speak or write in Sanskrit, it is not their tradition. Urdu is not Baul? Bauls are only from Birbhum!
The term Baul is made of 2 Sanskrit words, Vayu Tula, B is V in Bengal thus, Vayu = Bayu, Tula is to balance, balance what the vital airs (prana) through the breath. Bauls practice what they call as what Babu Kishan explained to me Vayu Dharma is Pranayama through their singing and other techniques.
Vayu Tula = Bayutula, Batula = Baula = Baul, Bauls always shorten things down, this does not mean the watering down and the reductionism that is going on today.
Knowing who wrote the poetry is part of the authentic Baul tradition LINEAGE!
Who wrote the BAUL poetry today is of huge significance more today than ever!
With Baul being appropriated and watered down, saying it doesn’t matter who wrote the Bengali songs and yes Kirtans, is adharma (against Baul dharma, but not just Baul against all dhrama) the eternal Dharma.
When you quote Aurobindo or Ramakrisha you always write who wrote it, but when it comes to Baul it is a free for all?
You want to preserve Baul? Stop using Baul!
Put the correct poets name on the poetry?
Muslims and Islamist were never Baul, so preserving something that is under their umbrella is not Baul, if it came out of Bangladesh they all say they are Music Composer or that Qawwali is Baul while posting a picture of Nabani Das Khyapa Baul in your articles? Nabani never ever sang any Qawwali and is not associated with Qawwali?
Babu Kishan knows well what is Qawwali and what is Baul because he has recorded and produced music from some of the top Qawwali artists, he say's no way Qawwali is not Baul?
Bangladeshi Folk Songs are not Baul either?